Freeview & Digital Recorder

i've been toying around with the sky plus idea but.... now another option has presented itselff...

if i buy a digital freeview box, i can program it to record shows.  can i pause & rewind & fastforward while i'm watching?  can i program it to record all ? shows?  once i buy the box (which range from £60-180) are they relatively easy to set up?  do i need an aerial? 

We have a Humax one that does all of that and love it.  They are getting cheaper by the day too.

I would say it comes down to which channels you want?  I personally love all the sky movie channels, so a Freeview wouldn't have cut it for me.  But if you are OK with the channel selection, then the Digital Freeview boxes would be fine.  I forget the exact name of the one we were looking at a few months ago.  I will try and see if Jonathan (My in house technology consultant) can remember.

i wish i had an in-house techno guru.  i've been trying to set up wireless for 2 months to no avail.

seems that i can't get Freeview in my area, but I can get Sky Freesat.  Does anyone know if you can use the standard Sky box with SkyFreesat?  Can you upgrade to Sky Plus box and stay on Freesat?

We have Sky but the reception has been so horrid that techie hubby went out and bought me a Freeview box for when Sky goes out. You just don't get as many channels with it. We got the basic box for like £30.

BTW...if you're in London...I rent techie hubby out...for some things. 

i'll trade you your technie husband for my painter/diy extrodinare boyfriend.

It's true you don't get as many channels with a Freeview box as you do with Sky (and I am sure I could get more channels if I changed my aerial....) - but Film 4 is now free on Freeview.

I seldom watch telly - but when I do it's nice to see re-runs of Friends on E4+1 (which I watch since I can't get E4....weird...) - I missed loads of them when I moved here.

I think it's worth it for a Freeview box - especially if you aren't a tv addict - a little bit more choice.

DH and I don't want to spend the money for Sky so we just have the Freeview box and pay for Top Up TV which is £7.99 a month. They are always adding new channels to it and that's all we really need.


On a side note DH just informed me that BT will shortly be launching a combined freeview box with an interactive video download service where you can also connect the box to your broadband line and download a vast library of movies, music, tv programs, etc. This should be up and coming in the few months.

And you get Film Four on Freeview now.

The Godfather is on tomorrow night.

If it wasn't for sky one, I'd have dropped cable months ago - I don't watch much of it at all.

unfortunatly, i don't get freeview in my postcode area.  i do however get FreeSat by Sky.  there appears to be a good range of channels. i think the only sticking point will be the lack of sky sports (aka permier foottie).

does anyone here have freesat?

do you have any more info on the BT combined deaL... can't find anything on their website...

unfortunatly, i don't get freeview in my postcode area. 

We were told that we didn't get freeview in our postcode area, but we decided to buy the cheapest set top box and try it anyway and it worked perfectly.

Some of the DTT (Freeview) coverage checkers are very conservative in their reports, and will often return no coverage when in fact with a decent antenna you can receive DTT just fine.

The DT group's installer guide here is likely to offer a better report (although still not perfect, due to localized variations in signal strength):

http://www.dtg.org.uk/retailer/coverage.html

thanks for that... no it really does show that i have little to no coverage in my area... poo...

do you have any more info on the BT combined deaL... can't find anything on their website...

DH is an av technician who is contracted to work at the tower where BT vision is based. He says you can register for more details at this site which will give you updates.   http://www.btvision.bt.com/

DH& I have sky+ box wow do we ever love the fact that you can record something & watch something else at the same time. also you can pause live shows without any problems whats so ever. also if you like alot of American shows sky & sky+ is great cause you get Living TV, Living TV +, & Living TV2 that has alot of American shows on it.  so in my opinon & dh's opinon sky+ is the way worth it what we pay.